Suddenly the money he’s pocketed from the sale of the painting hardly seems a sufficient offering. What can he possibly give her? He leans forward and barely kisses the worst scar running up her left cheek, and that gentle brush makes his lips buzz again. He’s hungry for more of her. He moves closer and breathesin the heavenly scent of flowers and dough and cream. She leans into him with a small cry so he indulges himself, kissing her cheek, her chin, then at last tasting her lips. Her sweet, rosy lips that spoke the most important words of his life.
Yes, I’ll marry you.
Of course you can do it.
You’re going to be a dad.
I love you always.
“Can you forgive me, Helen? Dear Helen.” He regrets so many things—especially what hurt Helen—but he does not regret this moment, and they never could have had it without the tumultuous journey that came before it. Not to this intensity, this unfolding sweetness.
We’re all broken,said Earnest Hemingway.That’s how the light gets in.
Her voice trembles. “Oh how dearly I love you, William.”
He kisses her harder. Pulling her closer, onto his lap. She wraps her arms around him and presses in, taking more than she’s giving, hungry for him.
They explore one another’s faces with kisses, relearning the other with eagerness.
They’re breathless, but he leans into her, trailing quick kisses along her skin. He pulls back to look at her—his Helen, in his lap, in his arms. Looking at him as if seeing him is the finest thing this side of heaven. He caresses her cheek, getting lost in her lovely eyes. He hasn’t the words, so again, he borrows from Mr. Hardy: “I shall do one thing in this life—one thing certain—that is, love you, and long for you, and keep wanting you till I die.”
She buries her face in his neck and clings to him, so he lifts her, cradling her in his arms, and carries her into his sanctuary. He pauses just inside the doorway and stares at the words on the opposite wall, hearing their melody in his soul.
He hideth my soul
in the cleft of the rock…
Helen relaxes in his arms as they step inside, as if she too feels the peace that pervades Dunn Cottage. She is at home in the arms of her love.
Love is…two broken people fitted together to hold each other up, to point each other toward God and wholeness and ordinary beauty, to small things that bring lasting joy. And becauseof brokenness in the world, perhaps all romancesdoend at marriage.
But that’s precisely where a love story begins.
Epilogue
Merryn, 1948
TheenchantmentofDunnCottage wraps around my soul as I enter again, even after so many years. I tug my husband through the doorway, and AJ ducks to enter, but pauses with reverence in the place where we once rediscovered one another.
He loops his thumbs in his suspenders, his voice quiet. “Quite a place, isn’t it?”
I hold my breath, not daring to ask the words I so often think but usually keep to myself—do you remember?
He casts his gaze over the fireplace where he once fried fish for me, the table where he propped my recovered brooch, and the chair where I sat with my injured legs…as his gentle hands cared for the wounds.
Can he feel that touch yet, as I can?
The door opens again, and two of our young grandchildren bound in—Cecil’s precious Marta and Anders, who’ve taken a tour of my old haunts about the shoreline. “Grandmama! Tell us about the field.” Marta, a delightful girl of six, springs up to me and I’m compelled to sit so she may bound onto my lap. “What was up on that hill?” She has Cecil’s elfin ears, which delights me to no end. Even though the children born to us had families as well, these two precious babes of Cecil’s reign over their own corner of my heart.
“Ah! You’ve been to see Dunn House. What’s left of it, that is, after the burning.”
Anders blinks from the shadows—I have his attention as well.
“Butthisis Dunn House,” she says.
“Actually,” I say, gathering her close, “this is Dunn Cottage, but once the Dunns belonged to a magnificent estate up on the rise called DunnHouse. It was well known in these parts, but it was destroyed many years ago, when my mum was a girl.”
“An estate! Oh, how dreadful it’s gone.”
